


Beyond The Circle: Circle Of Magic Comes To Our World

by reader1718



Category: No Fandom, West Side Story (1961)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-28
Updated: 2015-01-28
Packaged: 2018-03-09 11:54:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3248720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reader1718/pseuds/reader1718





	Beyond The Circle: Circle Of Magic Comes To Our World

￼Beyond The Circle: Circle Of Magic Comes To Our World

One day Tony Wyzek was out down by the docks with his friends in the Jets gang, when they came upon a blacksmith shop in which a strong, well-muscled man was pounding a piece of iron flat on an anvil. Tony immediately moved closer, drawn to the flickering flames and the sound of the hammer on the anvil. Riff called his name, but Tony didn’t respond, so Riff and the boys moved on. Tony moved into the forge to watch the man and saw him draw some metal from the fire that was burning a cherry red color. Tony could see his grip on the metal was awkward from where he stood, so it was no surprise when the man dropped the metal. Without thinking of the danger, Tony grabbed the red hot metal before it could hit the ground. He handed it to the very surprised smith, who immediately asked to see his hands. Tony held them out and they discovered the palms were unmarked, plus there were no visible burns, even though he’d handled hot metal. The man told him this meant he was an ambient smith mage, then admitted to being one himself and that he’d been waiting for a student who shared his gift. He then asked if Tony would like to learn smith craft, saying that he’d teach him to use and control his power at the same time. Tony eagerly said yes, but that he’d have to get permission from his parents. He asked them that night and they agreed. Tony started lessons the next day, not telling his friends where he was going, but making up an excuse instead.

￼They began the lesson with meditation, breathing in rhythm and practicing drawing inward to focus and control the power within. Then his teacher got Tony to identify metals that were hidden under cloth, saying he could use any sense except sight. Tony found out each metal had a smell and a certain feel to it that were unique, making them easy to identify. The only one he had trouble with was tin. Then he started practicing making nails as he was instructed to do. Two girls and a boy came by and watched, fascinated by what he was doing. Once Tony finished, they introduced themselves. Their names were Alison, Andrew, and Rachael, and they were all mages just like him. Alison’s power was with thread craft, Andrew’s focused on the weather, and Rachael’s dealt with plants. Because they were all mages, they became fast friends and were soon inseparable, becoming known as “the four mages”. Soon he was hanging out with them more than his other friends and the boys began to feel jealous. The greatest test of their friendship and ability to work as a team would come sooner than expected, though, and in the form of a natural disaster.

The four mage kids were taking a trip to see the Metropolitan Museum of Art one day when suddenly an earthquake struck the city, causing the part of the street they were on to cave in, sending them tumbling into a hole in the street, then burying them under tons of debris! Each tried to shift the debris with their powers, but it was just outside of their magical reach. Finally, Allison thought of spinning their powers together like thread. She passed a thread with four lumps in it to Tony, instructing him to grab one of the lumps and put something of himself in it, then pass it to Andrew, who’d do the same with the second lump, Rachael the third, and she’d take the last, then she’d take it back. They did it, Tony giving his lump the memory of holding hot metal in his hands, Andrew giving his the memory of holding lightning in his hands when he was five, Rachael gave hers the memory of some moss that grew under her favorite tree, and Allison gave hers the memory of the first thread she’d ever spun. She then took it from them and began to spin it, binding them together. They were then able to reach the pieces of debris they’d been unable to before and were able to move them and escape from the hole. They discovered that a side effect of being spun together was that they were able to talk to each other mentally, which made communication easier, and they could see what one of the others saw by focusing on their lump in the thread. Unfortunately, what they didn’t know was that having their powers spun together meant that they’d started to bleed over into each other, as Tony would find out a week later when a routine assignment from his teacher went horribly wrong in front of his friends.

The following week, Tony was in the blacksmith shop again doing his meditative exercises while his mage friends watched, when who should walk up but his non-mage friends. Riff and the others were surprised to see him there and started to ask what he was doing, when the blacksmith silenced them. He explained about the meditation and that it was helping Tony to control his powers. Riff and the other boys didn’t believe in smith magic at first—even mocking their friend’s choice. But when Tony got through with the meditation and started doing the day’s task, they soon would. Tony started making nails like he was supposed to, but he felt anger at his friends surging up inside him as he picked up the metal with the tongs and he grabbed all the rods at once instead of just one. Riff and the boys were standing outside when they heard a scream. They went inside with Tony’s teacher and the three other mage kids, and saw Tony standing at the forge with a living metal vine twined around his arm that was growing! Tony was extremely frightened and didn’t know what to do. Unfortunately, neither did his teacher, so he told the kids to stay with Tony and try to pull the vine off him while he went for help. This made the Jets believe that their friend really could do magic, because after all, how else could something like this happen?

￼Soon the blacksmith returned with several adult mages who stared in astonishment at the living metal vine clinging to Tony. They got to work at once, and were able to extricate him after about an hour. They eventually found a curiosities shop that was willing to take the vine off their hands, but Tony and Rachael were sorry to see it go since their powers combined had made it. The adult mages all came to the conclusion that the spinning of the kids’ powers had caused them to bleed into each other, as the other young mages had had similar incidents. Alison had been handling some very fine embroidery and had ended up scorching it, Rachael had turned dirt to glass that had plants mixed in, and Andrew’s lightning had tried to behave like thread. So Alison was asked to weave a cloth map of their powers to determine where they were leaking into each other, with dividers to keep them from leaking any further. Once she did, the process stopped. Riff and the other Jets finally grew to accept their friend and his powers, plus they found friends among the other mages. Eventually when Tony, Alison, Rachael and Andrew grew up, they took on students of their own and the magic and adventure began all over again


End file.
